Political goings-on

Brit Hume’s Political Grapevine has some of the best political news that you may or may not have heard. Here are the highlights:

For all those worried about the deficit and how Bush’s tax cuts are “endangering our future” or “placing huge burdens of debt on our children” – the country is now running a $42 billion dollar surplus. How many shows and op-eds do you think this news will garner?

Google has refused to run an ad for RightMarch.com a website designed to defend Rep. Tom Delay. The ad contained the copy: “The Truth about Nancy Pelosi: learn about Pelosi’s many scandals and help us take back the house.” (Pelosi is involved in her own ethics scandals that are surprisingly not getting as much press as Delay’s). Google’s reason for refusing the ad is simply enough they claimed the ad violated their policy of “ad text that advocates against an individual.” The only problem is that the text was taken from an ad already on Google about Delay, RightMarch.com simply replaced Delay’s name with Pelosi’s.

Finally, did anyone has the feeling that the UN was trying to oust Bush in the 2004 election? There might be good reason for that feeling. The New York Sun is reporting that a senior UN official took a paid leave of absense to work for John Kerry’s presidential campaign. A U.N. spokesman said that no rules were broken. So apparently the official’s involvement in Kerry’s campaign did not violate their charter that states taht political involvement by employees be “consistent with independence and impartiality required by their status as international servants.” Somehow working for a candidate to defeat a sitting president is “consistent with independence and impartiality” – only in the UN, where Cuba has fair elections and China sits on the Human Rights board.